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tree_and_leafEnded up staying up a bit too late to watch Apparitions. It was quite good, though it had its schlocky moments, but I liked it on the whole, especially the rather banal, low-key ways in which possession was initially betrayed. It was, unsurprisingly given that it's a drama about an exorcist, slightly lurid at times, but not stupidly so, and it was quite good at some of the more subtle aspects of the religious view of life.
I liked Fr Jacob, on the whole, and also his secretary the no-nonsense-nun, because even if the story showed her as misunderstanding the situation, she did in the way any sensible, educated person would. Fr Jacob is sometimes a little bit lacking in common sense (getting someone to phone in an exorcism is bad enough, but leaving the mobile within reach of the person you seriously believe is possessed by a dangerous demon? Not sensible), but that struck me as - with one very minor exception - something about the character, rather than a sudden attack of stupidity to move the plot along. He also, and unlike his secretary, who kept saying 'This child is at risk of abuse, we need to tell Social Services', clearly hasn't learned much from the various scandals the Catholic Church has been involved in, because however pure his intentions were, saying 'phone my boss at the Vatican' when taxed with kidnapping is not going to go down at all well.
Possessed! guy was good - it was an understated performance, giving a sense of someone who was mostly functioning as normal, but with an underlying hint of something wrong which occasionally rose to the surface, sometimes unexpectedly. The moment when he went from begging his daughter to forgive him to exploding into violence was quite chilling, the more so because it had a real resonance with how abusive people behave - the frightening bits of that wasn't really supernatural. And I liked the way that part of him, almost until the end, was sub-consciously trying to fight the possession he couldn't admit to himself, and not through anything religious, but simply because he loved his daughter. That was just right.
On that note, the child actress was very good.
I also liked that the bit of the meeting on Mother Theresa's cause we saw started with someone telling a lame and dated joke about her. I bet there are moments like that. Also, J.H. Newman name-check later on in the episode!
Fewer bits of it than I expected made me head-desk. I did guess what was going on with S. Bartholomew, and I was irritated that Fr Jacob and the chief exorcist didn't at least mention that Bartholomew is always depicted carrying knives, or sometimes his own skin, in mediaeval depictions of the apostles in churches, in the 'what do we know about S Bartholomew?' conversation. I'll buy the rather lame 'well, he's not in the Bible much?' from a Protestant or a Catholic layman, but a man who is supposed to be concerned with saints in his line of work, and who spends a lot of time in Rome walking past lots of old churches which are stuffed full of statues of the apostles really ought to know that. And I don't know why they didn't have him do that, because even if they had guessed that something nasty involving knives was liable to happen to the poor little deacon Vimal, they had a much more concrete suspicion regarding a missing child, who they couldn't abandon, so it wouldn't have significantly altered the plot. As it was, I wanted to beat him repeatedly about the head with the Ladybird Book of Churches. (I note, though, that playing the 'taking the skin' literally, rather than having him struck down by insta-leprosy leaves the possibility open that Fr Jacob was right in the first place, and Vimal was cured by a genuine, divine miracle.)
Head-desky in a different way, though in this case one that seemed consistent with Fr Jacob's character flaws: er, you knew Vimal was gay and you never tried to address it? You didn't, for instance, try having a general discussion about a pastorally sensitive issue, especially as you obviously agree with the older, and considerably theologically superior viewpoint (it's irrelevant, as long as you keep your vows of celibacy), rather than the ridiculous new thing about gays being unsuitable for the priesthood (reason given in this case being a suggestion that it's putting them in danger of temptation to stray, but come on, it's no different for straights)? Or talking, again if you like in a general way, about how homosexuality doesn't mean that God rejects you? Or giving the poor kid some sense that you wouldn't reject him as a friend for being queer (because you clearly didn't)? FAIL.
Also, clip from the teaser, with Fr Jacob telling a demon 'You'll never destroy my faith!' - I have a really, really bad feeling about that. The Bad Tempered Cardinal (though I can't say I entirely blame him for concluding that Jacob had lost it, in the circumstances) saying 'take care that your conscience doesn't lead you out of the Church' also struck me as a hint of future plot developments.
I did like all the stuff about vocation - the way that Jacob is simultaneously giving Vimal good advice of to the 'Of course you don't feel ready, no-one ever does' and rejecting everything telling him he might be called to something slightly different than what he's comfortable with felt very real. Though I felt uneasy about Jacob's insistence that laughter is the devil's first line of defence - sometimes, maybe, but I agree with Lewis (and Luther and Thomas More, an unexpected combination) that the devil actually 'cannot endure to be mocked' and that often it's very healthy to laugh in the face of temptation. It helps you get things in proportion, for one thing, and is helpful in remembering that actually, evil is going to lose in the end.
Found myself wondering if you could tell the same story in the C of E, and concluding, probably, no.
I liked Fr Jacob, on the whole, and also his secretary the no-nonsense-nun, because even if the story showed her as misunderstanding the situation, she did in the way any sensible, educated person would. Fr Jacob is sometimes a little bit lacking in common sense (getting someone to phone in an exorcism is bad enough, but leaving the mobile within reach of the person you seriously believe is possessed by a dangerous demon? Not sensible), but that struck me as - with one very minor exception - something about the character, rather than a sudden attack of stupidity to move the plot along. He also, and unlike his secretary, who kept saying 'This child is at risk of abuse, we need to tell Social Services', clearly hasn't learned much from the various scandals the Catholic Church has been involved in, because however pure his intentions were, saying 'phone my boss at the Vatican' when taxed with kidnapping is not going to go down at all well.
Possessed! guy was good - it was an understated performance, giving a sense of someone who was mostly functioning as normal, but with an underlying hint of something wrong which occasionally rose to the surface, sometimes unexpectedly. The moment when he went from begging his daughter to forgive him to exploding into violence was quite chilling, the more so because it had a real resonance with how abusive people behave - the frightening bits of that wasn't really supernatural. And I liked the way that part of him, almost until the end, was sub-consciously trying to fight the possession he couldn't admit to himself, and not through anything religious, but simply because he loved his daughter. That was just right.
On that note, the child actress was very good.
I also liked that the bit of the meeting on Mother Theresa's cause we saw started with someone telling a lame and dated joke about her. I bet there are moments like that. Also, J.H. Newman name-check later on in the episode!
Fewer bits of it than I expected made me head-desk. I did guess what was going on with S. Bartholomew, and I was irritated that Fr Jacob and the chief exorcist didn't at least mention that Bartholomew is always depicted carrying knives, or sometimes his own skin, in mediaeval depictions of the apostles in churches, in the 'what do we know about S Bartholomew?' conversation. I'll buy the rather lame 'well, he's not in the Bible much?' from a Protestant or a Catholic layman, but a man who is supposed to be concerned with saints in his line of work, and who spends a lot of time in Rome walking past lots of old churches which are stuffed full of statues of the apostles really ought to know that. And I don't know why they didn't have him do that, because even if they had guessed that something nasty involving knives was liable to happen to the poor little deacon Vimal, they had a much more concrete suspicion regarding a missing child, who they couldn't abandon, so it wouldn't have significantly altered the plot. As it was, I wanted to beat him repeatedly about the head with the Ladybird Book of Churches. (I note, though, that playing the 'taking the skin' literally, rather than having him struck down by insta-leprosy leaves the possibility open that Fr Jacob was right in the first place, and Vimal was cured by a genuine, divine miracle.)
Head-desky in a different way, though in this case one that seemed consistent with Fr Jacob's character flaws: er, you knew Vimal was gay and you never tried to address it? You didn't, for instance, try having a general discussion about a pastorally sensitive issue, especially as you obviously agree with the older, and considerably theologically superior viewpoint (it's irrelevant, as long as you keep your vows of celibacy), rather than the ridiculous new thing about gays being unsuitable for the priesthood (reason given in this case being a suggestion that it's putting them in danger of temptation to stray, but come on, it's no different for straights)? Or talking, again if you like in a general way, about how homosexuality doesn't mean that God rejects you? Or giving the poor kid some sense that you wouldn't reject him as a friend for being queer (because you clearly didn't)? FAIL.
Also, clip from the teaser, with Fr Jacob telling a demon 'You'll never destroy my faith!' - I have a really, really bad feeling about that. The Bad Tempered Cardinal (though I can't say I entirely blame him for concluding that Jacob had lost it, in the circumstances) saying 'take care that your conscience doesn't lead you out of the Church' also struck me as a hint of future plot developments.
I did like all the stuff about vocation - the way that Jacob is simultaneously giving Vimal good advice of to the 'Of course you don't feel ready, no-one ever does' and rejecting everything telling him he might be called to something slightly different than what he's comfortable with felt very real. Though I felt uneasy about Jacob's insistence that laughter is the devil's first line of defence - sometimes, maybe, but I agree with Lewis (and Luther and Thomas More, an unexpected combination) that the devil actually 'cannot endure to be mocked' and that often it's very healthy to laugh in the face of temptation. It helps you get things in proportion, for one thing, and is helpful in remembering that actually, evil is going to lose in the end.
Found myself wondering if you could tell the same story in the C of E, and concluding, probably, no.
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(no subject)
Date: 2008-11-25 08:43 pm (UTC)I can never quite out of my mind that the 'homosexual priests are put in the path of temptation to stray' refers to access to children, because as we know all gay men are paeodophiles. I don't think that IS what the Vatican thinks, but it's uncomfortably close, because why are gays any more likely to stray than straights?
(no subject)
Date: 2008-11-26 12:16 am (UTC)I have the same feeling as you, although I have wondered if the latest statement of the Pope's, which seemed to say that gay men can't be priests because they are girly and effeminate, and we can't be having girly people in a pastoral role because they aren't paternal enough (er, I'm paraphrasing, but only slightly) has got something to do with a subconscious anxiety about the masculinity about celibate males.
I don't know; that doesn't make much sense, but neither did what Benedict said...
(no subject)
Date: 2008-11-28 09:06 am (UTC)once again showing that quite a lot of homophobia (against men, anyway OH WHY WON'T ANYONE THINK OF THE LESBIANS! WOE!) is extremely closely linked to a sort of underlying misogyny.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-11-28 10:10 am (UTC)